


every park bench screams your name

by heybernia



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: M/M, an attempt at a character study, when i say it's vague i mean it's vague
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-01
Updated: 2019-07-01
Packaged: 2020-06-02 07:51:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,729
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19437109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heybernia/pseuds/heybernia
Summary: "Next year, Johnny. Next year, it’s going to be me and you, we’re going to rule the fucking world," PK screams into John’s ear and everything else, the whole entire world, it's all gone quiet.John can’t remember whether he replied with a scream or a whisper, and can't remember what he said because the only memory John has is PK holding him tight and not letting go. It doesn’t matter if anyone else heard him because the person who mattered most did.





	every park bench screams your name

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by [delightfulalot](https://archiveofourown.org/users/delightfulalot/pseuds/delightfulalot) in the [PuckingRare2019](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/PuckingRare2019) collection. 



> **Prompt:**
> 
> they were inseparable as kids but now they're only officially hanging out with their third childhood bff steve stamkos instead of each other!  
> why! did they break up? what happened? (oh my god if you give me a persuasion au i will actually love you FOREVER)
> 
> this is one of those occasions where the prompt and the final fic are nowhere near the same but hopefully it turned out okay anyway. 
> 
> the title is from the song i still remember by bloc party

_“And nobody understands. That’s, that’s the cool thing about sports. Is that there’s so many different reasons as to why a player can switch or where they play. It’s not just always based on just hockey.”_

*

John had always wanted to leave home. 

Nothing against his family, he loved them. Nothing against Toronto, he did love the city. He loved how you could get lost in it most of all, a landscape painting of colours and concerte.

This one story always go on rounds during family parties. Apparently, John once asked if he could move to the moon, and when John was asked why, the only thing John said was because you could fill the holes with water and make rinks out of them. It always gets loud laughs. It’s something worth laughing about, trying to turns places into somewhere you’d belong. A setting that resembles something closer to a home.

John’s left thinking about that now. About wanting to live on the moon, faraway from everyone else, about finding a way to breathe. It'd be easier probably, to leave for the moon then having to decide where he wants to spend his time now. 

*

_Bellevue. 2007._

“Dude, you went so overboard.”

PK scrunches up his face, rolls his head from side to side, and does the same with his hands. “Maybe,” he concedes. “Possibly. Definitely maybe.”

John shakes his head. “Did you forget we were going to catch dinner afterwards?”

“No,” PK says vehemently which John takes to mean that yes, yes he did. Most of the time, John doesn’t know what PK’s thinking. He can’t imagine how he goes through things and what runs through his head, so it’s a nice thing probably that PK’s thoughts swirl and twist until they come dancing out his month. Never stopping, always alive. 

“Who the fuck follows people to the bench?”

“Your biggest fan, of course” PK says.

“Biggest pain in the ass more like,” John says.

“Can you really blame me, Johnny T? I had to make sure you remember me.” John laughs even though he doesn't intend to which sets PK’s huge, unmatched smile off. Shows off his white teeth that remind John of a shark sometimes. More Finding Nemo than Jaws, they're not sharp, but they seem to go on forever, like they'd be replaced if they ever fell out. 

“A pain in the ass,” John retitiares, hoping it comes across as anything but fond. It fails if PK’s smile is anything to go by, the way it reaches his eyes.

“You love me though,” PK says, before shoving a forkful of food into his mouth.

“It's a obligation Pernall,” John says.

“Nah, you’d love me anyway,” PK says, still in the middle of chewing.

“You’ve got no proof on that.”

John lets PK try to prove him wrong. He makes sure to listen to every argument PK lists and doesn't bother trying to think of any kind of rebuttals, lets the sound of PK's words until he has to stop and take a drink before he can carry on. John leaves him to it.

*

“This better not be a pitching call,” John says into the receiver of his phone. It’s raining in Los Angeles. Foggy enough too that John can’t make out any landmarks, can only barely see the lights of the cars passing underneath his window. It's something too close to a movie scene, standing in the dark bellows of the hotel room.

“It’s not,” Steven says. “This is a purely friendly call.”

“I’m meeting with the Bolts tomorrow,” John says. 

“I know. Like I said, not a pitch call, this is a personal call,” Steven says.

“I don’t believe you,” John says. He can't make out the moon at all. The sky is nowhere near clear enough.

“You don’t have to,” Steven says, rolling with it, not getting frustrated or letting any kind of emotion slip in. People think John’s like that, cold and stocic and bland, but he’s not. Steven is. John is not. Steven’s calm, solid, never lets anything phase him whether it's media or his own body, Steven sticks to his own thoughts always. John, the other hand, he's just plain fucking stubborn. Hates when things don't go his way, or the way he drew it out in his head. When John thinks he's ready, that's when he'll go. try to anyway. He goes to great lengths to hide what’s going on underneath. 

“People think it’s easier than it is,” Steven says. 

“For you it was,” John says. 

“Sure, it was,” Steven says. “All those sleepless nights were deliberate. I thought the bags under my eyes look was working well for me.

Steven’s different. He’s always been different. Him and John both went first overall. They played together as kids and they wore the same number and they play in the same position but they’re not the same. Steven and John aren’t the same, and they can be compared, but the only thing you’re going to end up with then is all the points where the lines don’t meet up. Where John falls short.

John likes to think he wouldn't have kicked up a fuss if if Steven's dad had given his son nineteen instead of John. That's what he chooses to believe. 

“I don’t want to regret anything,” John says slowly.

There’s a long pause filled by the sounds of the rushing cars through the puddles, the rain hitting the window, the sides of buildings emerging for the fog.

“I know," Steven says. He takes in a breath, loud enough that John can hear it. "You need to do what’s best for you John. Not just the best for now, or for your career, but for after.” 

He’s not lying, John knows. Steven tells the truth and sometimes the truth is hard to hear. It’s harder for some reason, when John already knows the truth.

*

_Belgrade. 2008._

“PK, if you change the channel one time, I swear to fucking god,” Steven says. He reaches from the remote but PK shifts away, stretches his arm out as far as he can. from where he's sat on the floor and Steven is lying on the bed.

“I’m trying to find something in English that’s not the golf equipment channel!" PK's voice has gone high like it does occasionally, mostly when he thinks he's being attacked for no reason.

"If you order today, you too could get some quality bonus balls free," John says, echoing the background noise he's been hearing for the past however many days. 

"PK, give me the remote so I can chuck it at Johnny," Steven says. 

"Hell no, you can't be trusted," PK says, turning to look at them while continuing to scroll through the channels. 

“For fuck’s sake, just leave it on something,” Steven says. “Why I am hanging out with you two?"

“I’ve done nothing, why am I getting involved in this?” John asks from the safety of the other bed.

“We need to keep you light, Stammer, how else are you supposed to get me and Johnny here that gold medal,” PK says. John has always liked PK. He’d always like PK no matter what, when or where. He’s too much at all points but that’s the PK Subban charm. He’s like that twenty-two, twenty-three hours in the day and then he'll surprise by going slow.

“Win your own medal, you tool,” Steven says. 

“I don’t need to when you’re going to put the work in for us," PK says.

"Stammer's our Odyssey next generation driver, let it do all the work for us," John says. 

PK starts laughing loudly. He doesn't seem to be breathing so he can't stop Steven from finally taking the remote off him, and he’s still laughing when he climbs back onto the bed to try and wrestle it off him. John just watches them from the other bed. It’s more interesting than the nature programme on the TV. 

They fit together, the three of them. They’ve all played with each before, John with Steven, Steven with PK, and PK with John. Never all together at the same time but the connection is still there.

John’s sure he’d have been fine if they both weren’t here. He would have made it work because that's what he did in Oshawa and that's what he's doing to have to do in the fall. If Steven wasn't here, maybe John would playing more. If PK wasn't here, then John wouldn't have had anyone stuck to his side on the bench, who'd be talking to him constantly despite all their cheering and the chriping. John would always have made it work, but this was the best kind of situation.

Steven delivers with the gold medals. The weight feels incredibly light in John's hand, like he could drop it and it'd bounce off the ice, and John almost does drop it when PK crashes into him, screaming nonsense words that John can feel.

“Next year, Johnny. Next year, it’s going to be me and you, we’re going to rule the fucking world," PK screams into John’s ear and everything else, the whole entire world, it's all gone quiet.

John can’t remember whether he replied with a scream or a whisper, and can't remember what he said because the only memory John has is PK holding him tight and not letting go. It doesn’t matter if anyone else heard him because the person who mattered most did. 

*

“You’re the main priority here John,” his agent tells him over lunch. Perhaps it wasn’t the best decision but John needed to leave the hotel room he was staying in, and there's enough anonymity in LA that it can work. It reminds him of New York a little, being able to blend into the crowds and background when it suits. For John, that’s a lot of the time, more so than not. “Your career and your family are the most important here.”

John presses his fork down into the still warm steak until it pierces up to the hilt, pulls it apart by force, lets it fall apart and bit by bit. 

“Have you made a decision yet?” 

John continues to chew, grinds his teeth down. “No.” He’s sick of being asked that. It’s his agent’s job, but he should know John better than this. He’ll tell him when he knows and nothing will make him get their faster. “You’ll be the first person to know when I do.”

“Of course. Just remember one thing. You’re only going to get one shot at this.”

John stabs another bit of meat on his plate. Hockey metaphors are always overdone. This is no exception.

*

_Ottawa. 2009._

“You need to come and visit Montreal.” 

John turns over to face PK. They're on the same bed today like they were a couple of days before. “When?”

PK has always looked the same. The lines in his face have grown, never shifted, but now, he seems to be a little muted. Shy's the word in John's head, but it's PK so shy can't be the right one."Before the draft. I want to show you around, just in case.”

“Just in case what?” John asks, wondering where PK's leading them.

“Just in case you end up eating at all the worst places and then you come whining to me. PK, PK, why did you let me eat here, the food was trash, I got food poisoning, threw up on stage while I was getting drafted, it was all over the jersey, and now I’m the laughing stock of the league before I’m even in it.”

John would never ask PK to stop. He'd rather “I would not do that.”

“Remember when you choose that rresturant in London." 

"My billets told me that was a good place." 

"And I ended up having to pay the price for it. My stomach wasn't the same for days," PK says. 

"I said I was sorry," John says. 

"You're going to need apologise better than that," PK says. 

"What do you have mind?" John asks. 

"Let's make a game out of it," PK says. It's always a race with PK, everything's a competition, and John hates to lose, even to PK. Especially to PK, he never lets John forget it and it makes John want nothing more than for him to be quiet, for John to be on top.

They win gold again and John ends up remembering even less than last year.

This time, the medal feels heavier in his hand. The gold is warm to the touch. It hits to bite when John's teeth dig in, but it's the good kind of pain. The kind that leaves John wanting more. That taste of metal with a hint of liquid rust.

*

John goes back to Toronto every summer and every year it's the same. Same streets covered in the same layers of chewing gum and grime, that same distinct smell of the heat and the same old blue sky. John ends up in Toronto every few months during the season to play, to see family, to walk around and feel the snow on his lips. 

John doesn't miss it too much while he's gone. It's comfortable returning in the same way it is looking into his childhood room. It's there if he ever needs it and it's okay if John never will. He probably shouldn't ever need it. 

He always thought the choice would be easy. That it'd be something he could make with his head and not his heart. Now, the choice has been presented to him, and he keeps on getting stuck on that naive belief he had, that it was going to be easy, like he had any real idea. That he’d knew once the choices were presented to him. Being sure about things is kind of his deal. Having a goal and reaching it, knowing what he wants and knowing he’ll achieve it.

Just because he thought something once doesn’t mean it’s the truth. Wanting something does not mean you’ll want it forever. The truth can shift, want can disappear. It always does in the end. 

*

_Montreal. 2010._

“Thanks for not following me to the bench this time,” John says. 

“Anytime,” PK says. He's talking inbetween eating his food this time. Must have learned manners somewhere. They're in PK's apartment, not in some resturant because they're not kids in the O anymore, they're supposed to be men in the show and the audience is always there, always watching. “I mean, I might have to resort to it later. You weren’t saying that much to me.”

"I didn't have much to say to you," John says.

"Nothing about your busy New York life?" PK asks, trying to nudge the conversation along. 

"Nothing you haven't already heard." 

"I'm always up for catching those repeats," PK says. "You always end up appreciating things more the second time around." 

"You're right," John says. "For once." 

They continue to talk over their food, PK leading and prompting, John listening and responding.

By the time John said he was going to go and the time PK let him put his hand on the door handle, John's eyes remained feeling heavy. PK 

“See you in a couple days. Remember to bring your wallet because you’re paying, and make sure it’s a nice fancy take out place, I’m not an easy date.” 

“You’re not an easy anything,” John says. 

"What does your dad always say, you gotta be true to yourself," PK brings up. "I'm just being myself.

John likes that. Has always liked that. PK was always himself and he could never be bothered to hide behind other people's opinions and shadows, shines too bright to ever do that, and he's still the same as ever. John thinks sometimes that he shines even brighter now. There's no need to prove it, it's enough to believe it.

"That's the only person you can be," John says. 

"It's the only person I need to be," PK says. 

They stand there for a moment, smiling at each other. 

"See you, PK," John says. 

"Bye Johnny," PK says. John waits for him to lock the door before he carries on down the hall to the waiting eleavtor. 

*

It comes down to two teams. John's pretty sure that he always knew that. He let the other teams pitch because he needed the time to think it all through and if the media knew who he was trying to decide between, the circus would already be unbearable. 

Not to say people can't guess because they can. It's probably pretty easy, but John can't think about that. Whatever headlines and articles sprout up would happen anything and there's so many of them that a few of them are guaranteed to land close to the target. 

*

_"He made the conscious decision to want to play in his home town and he has every right to do that. Toronto is the mecca of hockey, it’s the biggest market for hockey in the world.”_

*

_Ottawa. 2012._

This time, John is going to remember all too much from Ottawa. Sharp memories that cut in, dig in tight, despite being unimportant. Some of them are funny, a few make John smile, but none are actually important.

"I should be offended at that," Steven says out of nowhere, voice breaking above the loud beat of the music. 

"At what?" John asks.

"You saying I'm not important," Steven says. 

"I'm sorry I meant it," John says. 

Steven laughs at him, and John ends up laughing too. Loose lips to go along with some loose limbs. 

When John wakes up in the morning, he has a pulsing headache, a serious aversion to the light, and a missed call on his phone. He remembers things from the night before, how Steven kept on looking at his phone and how John did the same thing to create some kind of camaraderie, something else to unite them by. Not important, but repeating inside his head anyway. 

John has a voicemail too. The notification is sitting above the missed called. He doesn't listen to it until he's back in New York. Because once he's back in New York, normality can start again, the past 

*

John only remembers that he's in a different time zone from Steven when Steven picks up the phone on the fifth or sixth ring. John should probably apologise, ask to call him in the morning, and actually go to sleep instead of just staring at the ceiling while in bed, covers kicked off and almost falling off, and it all still lit up by the fancy lampshade.

"Johnny?" Steven's voice is sleepy. 

John had left the window open before he climbed into bed. Fresh air was greatly needed. Cars driving and the faraway sounds of people shouting were not needed. They're still not needed so John gets up to shut the window. 

"Johnny," Steven says again, still sleep-warm, still softer then he's ever heard it before. 

John thinks for a second he hears a grumble over the phone, the sound of a long exhale. 

"I'm sorry, go back to sleep," Steven whispers. "I'll be as quick as I can." 

John takes in a deep breath, warm air filling his lungs. Makes sense that. 

"John, what is it?" 

"I can call you again in the morning," John says. 

"Whatever it is, you can just say it now," Steven says. 

John wants to leave Steven alone. Wants to stick what he just said and not turn on a dime. 

His agent tells John he looks tired during breakfast. John agrees. He saw the bags beneath his eyes this morning when he got up out of bed. No point lying about it. 

*

_Sochi. 2014._

"I wish we didn't have to carry you to a gold medal," PK says, sitting on the end of the bed, far enough away that there's this gap between his hip and John's foot. 

"It's just the game," John says, keeping his leg up and his knee straight. 

"Don't give me media answers," PK says, this strange tone to his voice. 

"Tell me what you want to hear then," John says, focusing on PK and not the pain in his knee. He's wearing a red hoodie emblazoned with the Team Canada badge and it's making John almost choke on the nostalgia, just the colours together.

"Do you remember filming that video? The one at World Juniors?" John asks, unable to hold the witfulness back. PK starts to laugh, and that's what John's intentions were, that's what they always are. Trying to return the favour, the golden light PK always bring.. 

"Couldn't forget it," PK says. 

It succeeeds in changing the subject because they end up talking about World Juniors which hasn't happened all too often before. They normally have other things to say to each other, other ways to spend what time they get together. 

Canada wins the gold medal and John's happy enough. He played enough that he feels like he did earn the medal and that it's not something that's simply being handed over to him. 

John needs help getting onto the ice. PK is already there waiting beside the entrance, tall in his skates, radiant in his jersey. 

"Watch yourself Johnny, I've got you," PK says, sliding his hand under John's armpit, and John wraps his fingers into PK's jersey. Someone else is happening John on the other side too, but they're quiet, they're letting PK do all of the talking. John keeps his head down, keeps his eyes on the ice until the gold medal is around his neck. It's back to feeling light again. John can lift his head without much effort. 

PK sticks to John, hand ready in case John falls. If he leaves, it's for barely a minute at a time to go hug Pricey again or to get Sid to say something stupid. 

"You don't need to babysit me," John says. 

PK gives him the classic Subban smile. "Just making sure you're not feeling left out," he says. 

John doesn't say that PK wearing red looks right. Right is not the correct word, but it's closer to one he could actually say now, here on the ice or somewhere in private. 

John spends the flight back to reality thinking about those colours. About gold and about red. Gold and red, red and gold, and so on, and so on. Forever mixing, forever swirlling. 

*

He keeps on watching the video the Leafs sent him. It was certainly a different kind of pitch, John gives them that. 

He's not one for analysing films, he prefers a popcorn flick, something that can blend into the background, but he keeps on watching the video as if something about is going to suddenly spur on his decision. A single frame, a single line, a single image that's bring John forward out of the past. 

*

_Nashville. 2016._

He doesn't know why Nashville is the place where it finally clicks for John, but it does. Might be just because he's older now, more mature. He's more like the person the media makes him out to be than he was a few years ago now. 

John's brain paints an image and that's the only thing it sees because that's the only thing it wants to see, and that affects how he thinks of everything. 

It shouldn't be a surprise, and nevertheless, it is. 

*

John's not used to having choices. He's used to making decisions. Having choices is what's messing him up probably. The temptation, the what could bes, the dreams. It's what he sees at night, what keeps him company during the day, each and everyone of those dreams.

_Nashville. 2017._

PK and gold have always gone together, the gold between PK’s teeth in the blurry photos from World Juniors locker room, the flecks scattered across his mouth that John would watch him wipe off. Now, he’s dressed in all gold, and it still suits PK to a t, and John still aches to touch it, for the feel of that molten warmth under his fingers.

“Hey cowboy,” PK says once he's stopped walking. They're not meeting somewhere private. It's some hidden corner of the arena where PK said it would be quiet, although that doesn't mean they'll be silence. John goes anyway though because he still trust PK to lead him.

“Aren’t you meant to be the cowboy now?" John points out, letting his heart do the talking. 

“I'm still learning the ropes about that," PK says. 

"So you're learning how to lasso," John says. 

"I wish. Need to learn how to ride first, apparently," PK says. 

"Should be easy for a natural like you," John says. 

"Everyone needs to practise," PK says. "It's not like riding a bike."

John should have more things to say to PK, should be able to carry on the conversation, but his throat feels dry and his bones feel tried and all his words seem to have escaped him. 

"We're getting old," John says. 

"Speak for yourself," PK says. There's a pause, and the PK that appears whenever John thinks of him disappears, and in his place, stands the PK of today. One that is older and more worn out. 

It used to be easy for PK to distract John from, from everything basically. The world would come to stand still. Now though, when they pause to meet each other, everything continues on around them, paths that they'll both slip back into eventually. PK in his fancy car and John on the bus, staring out the window, looking up to the crescent shaped moon. 

*

_“And you know, he’s a star player who’s played in the league for a long time. Deserves every penny that he’s getting paid, and has the opportunity, and wants the opportunity to win a Stanley Cup in his own town. And you know, if that’s what he wants to do, and that’s the decision that he and his family have made, I think good for him. Good for him.”_

*

It's been a while since the last time John tasted gold. Long enough that he yearns for it. Even Sochi feels far away now, like it was from another lifetime almost. Not everyone can win, that's impossible. Only one team can do it, only one ever gets so lucky. 

So much of it is pure luck. There's only so much John can control, that he could even attempt to change. 

Right now, the whole of his future in his hands. Most of it anyway, his heart is cradling a little bit of it as well.

*

_Toronto. 2017._

John’s not bitter that PK reaches a Stanley Cup Final before him, not like he was when Steven reached one a few years before.

If anyone deserves it, it's PK. John believes that because it's the truth. PK deserves to touch the silver of the Stanley Cup and if anyone could turn it to gold, it would be PK.

PK doesn't get that chance and John wonders whether that's his shot gone. If he'll ever get that close again. 

John tries to call him once a few weeks after the series is over. Ends up hearing PK's voice tell him that he'll back to him when he can. Then the beep goes off, and John doesn't make a sound before he hangs up. Before he puts his phone on silent. 

*

In the end, John chooses to return to Toronto because he could. 

John goes home because the choice was given to him. It’s a safe landing that he didn't need. It was something that was simply welcomed.

Lets the public make their comments, talk about how it was always meant to be, and John tells no tales of the dreams he had on that bed or since then. Says nothing about who he saw inside his dreams, the boy who shined bright enough to forever catch his gaze. 

*

_“I don’t think we see that enough in the league where guys really take it upon themselves to really make their dreams come true, and you know, not just do what everybody says they should do. [...] I think players should wanna make their dreams come true and it was a dream for John to play for the Toronto Maple Leafs.” - PK Subban on John Tavares signing with the Maple Leafs_

**Author's Note:**

> i'm on twitter @attababehisch


End file.
